Virologists at the Rega Institute at KU Leuven (Belgium) have developed a vaccine candidate that protects hamsters from infection with the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. Theirs is one of the first vaccine candidates that is proven to protect lab animals from infection. The team aims to start clinical trials next Winter. Their findings are pending peer review, but the researchers have already submitted their results to preprint server bioRxiv.
The team, which is led by Professor Johan Neyts and Kai Dallmeier, PhD, started developing eight prototypes of their vaccine against the new coronavirus in January. Lab experiments have now shown that one of these vaccine candidates is highly effective in hamsters. ...
